London Metropolitan University plans redundancies

Over the past few months lecturers at London Metropolitan University have been fighting university management over union recognition.

In May we voted unanimously to enter into a formal dispute over the issue.

Since the creation of the UCU union from the merger of the AUT and Natfhe, management have said that the pre-merger recognition agreement with Natfhe no longer stands.

Management have set up a staff association in an attempt to bypass the union. This follows the 18-month dispute over new contracts that management attempted to impose on lecturers at the university.

Now they are planning to cut 60 posts at the university, including compulsory redundancies. They have been planning these redundancies for months. The timing is planned to make it difficult for the union to fight back.

Last Saturday they advertised lecturing posts in the business school – posts that members who will be facing redundancy could fill.

The closing date for these posts is 10 July. How can they say that they have consulted lecturers when they are advertising positions before informing lecturers that they face redundancy.

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